Second Tier City

Winner of Best Documentary at the Vancouver Lift Off Film Festival 2017.

"Heart-breaking glimpse of large-scale urbanization in China and its consequences." Architecture Film Festival Rotterdam 2018

A short documentary about the city Yiwu in China and the people who live there. Yiwu has the largest small item market in the world which has over 50,000 stores. Young people in the surrounding area have been moving there to start a business.

Its called Second Tier City because cities in China are ranked by the government based on the money they generate, among other things, and Yiwu is considered second behind cities like Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou which are First Tier. Yiwu for it’s size is ranked rather high because of the massive market where you can buy every type of small item manufactured in China in one place and the massive amount of money and trade that generates.

This film primarily follows the lives of two young women who are chasing their dreams in Yiwu.